02
Sep
2022

Professional Reflective Portfolio- ETL512

categories: ETL512

Part A

A teacher librarian plays a vital role in a school setting. A teacher librarian is the person who inspires students to read, connects them with relevant information whether it be digital or print, teaches students about information literacy and how to navigate this as well as being a person students can go and talk to when feeling lost and overwhelmed in the school setting. A teacher librarian is committing to a life of learning and it is important that students see this in themselves also and that teacher librarians can assist them with the skills they need in life to learn in any situation. With appropriate planning and forward thinking, teacher librarians can have an impact upon students they will remember forever.

Figure 1: Whodunits, dolphins and family sagas: 10 new books to read in June. https://ozarab.media/whodunits-dolphins-and-family-sagas-10-new-books-to-read-in-june/

Part B

Literature

Immersing students in literature is vital from the moment they begin school and ideally before they even begin school. As Paul Jennings wrote in his book The Reading Bug, that reading to children from an early age creates feelings of warmth and happiness which in turn leads to an ongoing love of learning (Jennings, 2008, p. 17).

19 Little Tricks Guaranteed To Get Your Kids To ReadFigure 2: Buzzfeed Website: https://www.buzzfeed.com/jarrylee/little-tricks-guaranteed-to-get-your-kids-to-read

I always loved teaching but had such a passion for teaching literacy because of what all students no matter their age, socio-economic status, gender and academic abilities could gain from this. Hence, the decision to begin this course through Charles Sturt University was a very easy decision and one I am extremely grateful for embarking upon.

Literature across the curriculum (ETL402) was a subject that inspired me greatly within this course as there was much I learnt in relation to literature and immersing students in it. For example, when I began this course I was not aware of the interest levels students had towards audiobooks, e-books and an actual physical book. When reflecting on my learnings and my blog from this subject it was evident that an article we were required to read clearly showed that physical books were still extremely popular (Harvey, 2015) and I also noted on this on my recent placement. The e-books that were being borrowed in this school were mainly ones that the students may not have wanted other students to know they were reading and besides from that the students were all borrowing physical books.

ETL402 also enabled me to learn about what assists with immersing students in literature. We were given an article to read which I still reflect on to this day and it was not only eye opening but also inspiring. It was called, Read like a girl: Establishing a vibrant community of passionate readers (Stower & Waring, 2018). This article clearly outlined the importance of promoting literature in the school and it outlined ideas they used at this particular school to inspire reading such as author visits, events where mothers and fathers are invited to which includes immersion in literature, book launches and workshops to name a few.

When reflecting on my blog from ETL402 it was quite evident that I was unaware of how to find ‘quality’ literature. There is a great deal of literature available however it is important to take into account the cohort of students, their interests and reading abilities when putting through purchase orders. My blog shows that I was very enthusiastic to discover Magpies as well as the section within this website where one can find the genres of books (Catherall, 2020) as when starting out as a teacher librarian and going on my placement I found it overwhelming to decipher which genres books would be allocated to, particularly in libraries which have been genrefied.

My first blog post for ETL402 was fascinating to reflect upon as it was titled The future of childrens’ literature (Catherall, 2020). This post reflected upon the need for parents to understand the importance of reading for pleasure and how this then helps students achieve academically. Evidence has found that students who read for pleasure then read more and more which in turn leads to further academic reading and further understandings (Jennifer & Ponniah, 2015, p. 3).

To follow up on these understandings on my placement was extremely insightful. The school I was at was planning for a literary festival and I was able to be involved in some of the planning and watch the way in which the teacher librarians were planning for this. The highlight for me was seeing the way in which the staff and particularly the director of libraries planned to ensure that the main focus was to inspire students and parents by having a range of author visits. This then had a ‘knock on effect’ and the students wanted to read books by that author and then looked at the book in a completely different way due to seeing and hearing the actual author. My placement at this school showed me just how beneficial it is to hold these events to engage the entire school in reading as well as inspire and nurture the love of reading and reading for pleasure.

From a personal point of view, one of my strongest desires as a teacher librarian is to help students connect with books they love and enjoy. The more a student finds a genre or author they enjoy, the more they will read which as mentioned above leads to success. My goal will be to implement as many initiatives as possible to assist with helping the students develop a love of literature.

Figure 3: Overdrive blogpost (December 18, 2018) https://company.overdrive.com/2018/12/18/the-everlasting-importance-of-childrens-librarians/

Resourcing the curriculum

Resourcing the curriculum is an extremely important role of a teacher librarian. I was well aware of this while studying subjects such as Resourcing the Curriculum (ETL503) however it was fabulous on my placement to get a ‘hands on’ experience of this. One of the tasks I was asked to complete on my placement was to organise a set of books and online resources for the Year 7 history class on the topic of Ancient China. This gave me an insight into the importance of collecting resources that were relevant and up to date. I was also instructed to weed any books in this collection that were published before the year 2020, I was very grateful for this experience as it allowed me to peruse these books with a critical eye and assess how the books were either irrelevant or worn or the information was dated and therefore needed to be removed from the collection. Weeding can be a difficult task but extremely necessary (Broadbent et al., 2022, p. 1) which became evident throughout this task to ensure the staff and students had up to date resources. The school also had a weeding policy and one which was similar to the document below.

Figure 4: Kemp Independent School District website policy on weeding https://www.kempisd.org/591374_3

I was also given the opportunity to update the Libguides Ancient China page. This was an interesting task as half of the links on this page no longer worked which showed the importance of checking these before informing staff and students about the information on the the page for them. I was then able to update this page with new links and my supervisor gave me excellent information regarding the importance of not putting up clips and videos that may have advertisements down the side of the page as the students can then click on these and end up in places we would never suggest or recommend.

Throughout the subject, Resourcing the Curriculum (ETL503) we were given the opportunity to read a blog shared by Barbara Braxton titled Sample Collection Policy (Braxton, 2016) and from reading my reflection on my blog post it was evident that this was an extremely eye-opening document for me at the time. My post showed that I connected with her ideas of ensuring one has in mind a purpose, audience and usefulness when collecting resources and ensuring this is in the collection development policy (Catherall, 2018).

Another blog post of mine titled Collection policies for now and the future (Catherall, 2018) outlines the importance of ensuring there are collection policies in school libraries so that purchasing resources haphazardly doesn’t happen and consequently become wasteful. This blog post also showed my growing understandings of requiring not only a collection policy for the current state of the library but also for going forward so that there was a clear path with what the library would like to see in their collection. Prior to doing this course, I did not have any knowledge or understanding of a collection policy and this subject really showed me the importance of one and it was interesting to go on my placement and ask to see their collection policy also.

Digital curation was also a topic of great interest to me as I discovered that a collection policy also needs to ensure that digital information is recorded accurately so that it can be found going forward. Even for people now on a personal level it can be difficult to manage one’s photos and files so for a library it is vital that they have a clear direction and system in place so that they know exactly how to store files and documents and where they are going to store them. When digital information has been curated effectively it becomes available to people all over the world (Shankar, 2016, p. 55). This is an area I have not had much experience in and going forwards, I believe that I will need to do more such as professional development to gain further understandings into this area of curation.

Throughout ETL503, budgeting was discussed in order to ensure there were adequate funds for the resources needed. It became apparent very quickly, that it is important to plan for the year and years ahead to ensure that there is enough money to purchase not only the physical and digital books required but also the devices and databases required for the school (Stephens & Franklin, 2015, p. 161). This knowledge enabled me to have a discussion with the director of libraries on my placement and discuss how they budget for each year. Something which came up that I was unaware of was the difference in pricing between e-books and physical books as e-books are much more expensive. She then went onto tell me that the data on their system actually showed that students were rarely borrowing the e-books and were much more engaged with the physical books. Therefore, the budgeting for purchasing books became much more straightforward when analysing the data. Obviously, this is just a small part of budgeting when it comes to resourcing for the curriculum and libraries but it demonstrates the importance of analysing the information the library has.

Information Literacy

Information literacy is an important part of a teacher librarians role. All teacher librarians want their students to develop a love of reading if they do not already have one, however it is also vital that teacher librarians assist students in the sea of information which now exists in our world. My blog refers to an information society and information saturation (Catherall, 2017) therefore the important role teacher librarians have in educating students in this area.

The five minute video below shows a teacher librarian working with two year seven teachers on a unit of work. The teacher librarian wanted to know what outcomes the teachers would like the students to attain. This is an excellent video as it shows how happy the teachers are afterwards as the students demonstrated the ability to locate the information and put it into their own words to display their understandings.

https://www.aitsl.edu.au/tools-resources/resource/information-literacy-illustration-of-practice

Figure 5: Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership Limited. [AITSL], 2017.

Inquiry learning is an excellent place that teacher librarians can begin when teaching students about information literacy (Catherall, 2017). Teacher librarians can become quite involved and either teach the students this process or assist with helping classroom teachers teach the process. Below is a model from the Education Department of NSW which outlines a very effective way in which the inquiry process can be looked at in order to teach effective information literacy skills.

 

Figure 6:Department of Education- NSW government. Information skills in the school. (2015), p.8. https://education.nsw.gov.au/content/dam/main-education/teaching-and-learning/curriculum/media/documents/infoskills.pdf

This above model is similar to what I was lucky enough to see in process on my placement. One of the classes being taught was asking the students to answer questions relating to Ancient China and use a range of resources online and in the library. It was important that the students analyse the information and where it came from before recording answers. However, my thoughts while this was happening was that maybe teacher librarians should not be assisting students as far as having books related to the unit all boxed up for them and a webpage full of related information on their school portal for them? Is this really helping students decipher what information is relevant or correct? Does this help them when they get to university and they do not have as much guidance? This is why I believe there should be more ‘stand-alone’ classes teaching information literacy rather than just embedding it in a unit where teacher librarians have been heavily involved in collating resources.

This then brings us to the topic of leadership and ETL504 taught me the importance of ensuring that if information literacy should be taught on its own so that students can be more independent then leaders of the library need to work out a way to make this happen. As my blog throughout this subject suggested, teacher librarians need to be aware of the needs and what should be happening in the library and therefore do everything they can to make this happen (Catherall, 2020) by having a collaborative approach amongst staff.

My online study visits were such a fascinating part of this subject and course and probably my biggest highlight. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to the people who work at Sydney Archives, particularly as this is something I would be interested in doing outside of teaching in a school library. In relation to information literacy though, it was interesting to hear them discuss how they assist patrons within the sea of information which is on offer to find what they desire. They have a database which is a way of making the process of finding information and photos somewhat easier for the user. If the skills of becoming information literate in a school setting is taught appropriately then even using databases such as these would be even easier for the user again.

Fake news is another reason why students need to be taught about information literacy. It is important that students can be critical of the information they read and have the skills to evaluate it independently. It is easy to think that other teachers are teaching the skills to students to become information literate however this is not always the case which is why it is important to develop a program in the library to do this. It is important that students have instructions that are explicit in order to analyse the news and make their own informed opinions (Farmer, 2021, p. 11).

Part C

When beginning this course, I had never worked or volunteered in a school library. All of the information I was reading and listening to was completely new to me and admittedly a little overwhelming at first. When reflecting on this now, I am amazed by how much I have learnt as well as the large amount of skills I have gained which is evident throughout my blog.

My knowledge of the principles of lifelong learning (Australian School Library Association [ASLA], 2004) has definitely developed and I now believe that this is one of the most important aspects of being a teacher librarian as our job is to forever be a learner and teach others this important skill of being a learner also. It is vital that teacher librarians understand the different learning styles students have and intertwine this into their teaching and ensure that each student is reaching their potential. This course also encouraged me to do some volunteer work at different schools and through these opportunities and my placement I was able to see the different databases and websites schools use to assist students with their lifelong learning. I felt that this was extremely beneficial and an area that I was aware of needing to improve my skills in to become an effective teacher librarian.

I believe that Knowledge of the curriculum (Australian School Library Association [ASLA], 2004) is important and this was something that I did not feel confident about before my placement. I thoroughly enjoyed learning about how to use the curriculum throughout the course however I did feel unsure of how teacher librarians plan for the year and each term using the curriculum and one of my goals on my placement was to investigate this further. My placement gave me the opportunity of learning further about how to integrate the curriculum into the planning document and this gave me much more confidence before working as a teacher librarian.

Lastly, Learning and teaching (Australian School Library Association [ASLA], 2004) from the standards of professional excellence outlines the importance of ensuring programs are responsive to the needs of the students. Throughout the course, I felt grateful to learn the many different ways teacher librarians can plan for a variety of different foci which included teaching information literacy skills, analysis of books, benefits of reading different genres and follow up activities to go with books to name a few. When going on my placement and listening to the teacher librarian on the study visit, this was also extremely beneficial as I heard from other experienced teacher librarians how they teach, what activities they believe benefit the different learners in their class and what they see as being important roles that a teacher librarian holds.

I feel very lucky to have enrolled in this course as it has changed me in many ways and allowed me to further my knowledge and understandings in this ever changing world of information and libraries. Going forwards, I believe I need to continue to further my knowledge in the areas of information technology to ensure I am using the most up to date resources as well as providing students with exciting ways to continue learning and find reliable information. I am very excited about my future and the future for school libraries as I strongly believe they have so much to offer for students and staff.

References

Australian School Library Association. (2004). Standards of professional excellence for teacher librarians. https://asla.org.au/resources/Documents/Website%20Documents/Policies/TLstandards.pdf

Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership Limited. (2017). Information literacy. https://www.aitsl.edu.au/tools-resources/resource/information-literacy-illustration-of-practice

Buzzfeed. (2017). 19 little tricks guaranteed to get your kids to read. https://www.buzzfeed.com/jarrylee/little-tricks-guaranteed-to-get-your-kids-to-read

Braxton, B. (May, 2016). Sample collection policy, collection development. 500 Hats. http://500hats.edublogs.org/policies/sample-collection-policy/

Broadbent, D., Goates, M.C., Frost, M., Gregory, N.M., Pixton, D.S. (2022). In their own words: Perspectives on collection weeding from library employees and teaching faculty. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 48(4), 1-12.

Catherall, E. (2017, July 27). The information society. Emma’s learning journal. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/emmasonlinelearningjournal/category/etl401/

Catherall, E. (2017, October 2). Reflective practice. Emma’s learning journal. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/emmasonlinelearningjournal/category/etl401/

Catherall. E. (2018, January 13). School library collection policy. Emma’s learning journal. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/emmasonlinelearningjournal/category/etl503/

Catherall, E. (2020, March 19). The future of children’s literature. Emma’s learning journal. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/emmasonlinelearningjournal/category/etl402/

Catherall, E. (2020, March 30). Encouraging reading in the school environment. Emma’s learning journal. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/emmasonlinelearningjournal/category/etl402/

Catherall, E. (2020, September 6). 21st century learning. Emma’s learning journal. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/emmasonlinelearningjournal/category/etl504/

Department of education- NSW government. (2015). Information skills in the school. https://education.nsw.gov.au/content/dam/main-education/teaching-and-learning/curriculum/media/documents/infoskills.pdf

Farmer, L. (2021). Teachers’ perceptions of students’ news literacy [Paper presentation]. The 49th Annual Conference of the International Association of School Librarianship, Brantford. https://www.proquest.com/docview/2664102664?parentSessionId=g1d25ydW3TFjFFtQMFMmN6xEy7PozNmf38N8czIcuSk%3D&pq-origsite=primo&accountid=10344

Harvey, E. (2015). Five trends affecting children’s literature. In Book Business https://www.bookbusinessmag.com/article/what-we-learned-from-the-top-trends-in-childrens-literature-webinar/

Jennings, P. (2008). The reading bug and how to help your child catch it. Penguin Books.

Jennifer, M.J., & Ponniah, J.R. (2015). Pleasure reading cures readicide and facilitates academic reading. I-Manager’s Journal of English Language Teaching, 5(4), 1-5. https://doi.org/10.26634/jelt.5.4.3664

Kemp Independent School District. (n.d). Policy on weeding. https://www.kempisd.org/591374_3

Overdrive blogpost (2018, December 18). The everlasting importance of childrens’ librarians. https://company.overdrive.com/2018/12/18/the-everlasting-importance-of-childrens-librarians/

Oz Arab Media. (June 5, 2022). Whodunits, dolphins and family sagas: 10 new books to read in June. https://ozarab.media/whodunits-dolphins-and-family-sagas-10-new-books-to-read-in-june/

Shankar, K. (2016). Future proofing the digital society: An introduction to digital curation and data practices. ACM SIGCAS Computers and Society, 46 (1), 54-57 https://dl-acm-org.ezproxy.csu.edu.au/doi/pdf/10.1145/2908216.2908224

Stephens, C.G. & Franklin, C. (2015). Library 101: A handbook for the school librarian (2nd ed.). Englewood.

Stower, H. & Waring, P. (2018, July 16). Read like a girl: Establishing a vibrant community of passionate readers. Alliance of Girls Schools Australia. Retrieved from https://www.agsa.org.au/news/read-like-a-girl-establishing-a-vibrant-community-of-passionate-readers/

 

 

05
Oct
2020

Part B Reflection- Assessment 2- ETL504

categories: Assessment Two- Part B, ETL504

Participation throughout ETL504 has led me to discover how complex leadership can be and that there is not just a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Different styles of leadership will be displayed by teacher librarians at different times, in different situations and in a range of contexts (Haycock, 2010, p. 2) which has been evident throughout the case studies and module readings.

The group work for the case studies provided an interesting insight into the dynamics of groups and how they can successfully work, or not. Group 2’s, case study 4 discussion board displays what was involved for us to become established and have clear understandings about how to achieve our goals. My personal aim was to implement a feeling of collaboration from the beginning (Catherall, 2020, August 30) and ensure everyone knew that their opinion and thoughts were important and could be heard which is important for team building. Transformational leadership which includes a team-building and collaborative approach usually results in positive change (Ingram, 2019). This was somewhat successful however as the result of a team member having a stronger desire to ‘get things moving’, the collaboration did not go as planned and it turned into more of a transactional approach which assists with getting work done in a time frame however does not allow for people to feel valued.

Throughout these case studies I found that some members were possibly not being adequately involved enough as a result of not feeling valued (Catherall, 2020, July 28) and possible lack of transformational leadership throughout activities. I did attempt again in case study four (Catherall, 2020, September 19) to be collaborative but there was no response. In a scenario like this again, it would be worthwhile to try and develop stronger relationships before becoming task oriented as outlined by Tracey Ezard in this post (2018, October 17) about developing relationships with those around you to gain results.

Infrequent communication was problematic, particularly in the final case study (Catherall, 2020, September 28) when no one had volunteered to put the concluding piece together. I had learnt from what I could see developing that I would need to take the lead and ask if someone who had not done this yet would be willing. I reflected upon case study one (Catherall, 2020, July 16) and I recognised through this that it was important for others to take the lead also. I was hoping as a result of particular members modelling behaviours and taking the lead as a transformational leader that others would then do this voluntarily; this was not the case. Expectations from the beginning were not made clear about everyone’s involvement which obviously became a problem.

For future directions, it is important to note that teacher librarians need all staff to know exactly what is required of them and how this benefits the ‘team’ which would have been useful in the beginning of our group case study discussion. Overall, our group was friendly and everyone did contribute. If expectations were clearer from the beginning though, it may have been more collaborative and had higher levels of communication.

References

Ezard, T. (2018, October 17). Do you love you people as much as your purpose? Tracey Ezard: Ferocious warmth leadership, high performance teams. https://www.traceyezard.com

Haycock, K. (2010). Leadership from the middle: Building influence for change. In S. Coatney (Ed.), The many faces of school library leadership (pp. 1-11). Libraries Unlimited.

Ingram, D. (2019, February 4). Transformational leadership vs transactional leadership definition. Hearst Newspapers: Small Business. http://smallbusiness.chron.com/transformational-leadership-vs-transactional-leadership-definition-13834.html

28
Sep
2020

Case Study Five Reflection

categories: ETL504

The responses for this case study came through a little slower this time but everyone once again contributed which was just fantastic! There seemed to be an understanding amongst our group that we all contributed and this made it easier for everyone in the end. The only problem we had with this case study was no one had volunteered to put together the final piece for the discussion forum. I ended up asking if anyone who had not yet done this would be interested in doing it and one of the group members volunteered which was great.

Overall, I believe our group worked well together as a result of open communication and honesty. Everyone played their part and this contributed to being able to produce a final document with strategies for each case study. I believe the key to our success was being able to clearly understand at the start where we needed to post and what we needed to do and from there it was very simple.

19
Sep
2020

Case Study Four Reflection

categories: ETL504, Reflections

It was great starting the case study this time as we all knew what we were doing with the technology side of things within the forum. It felt as though we were much more efficient in getting started and most group members contributed quickly.

I volunteered to do the final summary to post onto the discussion forum and also asked if everyone was happy with that which they were. Our group was quite efficient this time in getting our thoughts and strategies onto the discussion board and into the wiki which made it easier for me to collate them in order to place into one document.

I did notice though when reading through them that a couple of strategies were quite similar. As a result I had to try and join them together and one of them was more of a summary rather than a strategy.

For the next case study, it would be beneficial at the beginning to suggest on the discussion board that when it comes to strategies we should try to have different ones. This would benefit our learnings and obviously create a variation of strategies to present.

Unfortunately, when I put the final piece together I tried to be collaborative by asking for feedback before posting (particularly in relation to leadership strategies in the case study), I did not receive a response. This is possibly as group members had not checked the discussion board and also because they felt time poor. Going forward, it may be beneficial to post a reminder on the discussion board at the beginning of the next case study for members to check this each day for any questions or clarification.

13
Sep
2020

Strategic Planning

categories: ETL504

It was extremely interesting reading this section as it clearly outlined the best possible way to achieve positive and effective outcomes in school libraries.

I particularly enjoyed completing the ‘personal strategic plan.’ What a fabulous idea! Being on maternity leave, this was the perfect opportunity to do this and establish clear goals and objectives for myself. Following on from this was an example of a strategic plan for a library. I have not seen a document like this before and it was extremely interesting and intriguing to look at and consider how I would use this document in a library.

I really liked how it began with the vision and mission statement as these outline what an institution wants to achieve and from here the strategies implemented should be in line with these. This document is broken up into three sections of: Teaching and learning, environment and policy and procedures which makes it very clear, explicit and easy to read. I also liked the way it was divided into year levels because it is impossible to cover the above topics for the whole school. If it is broken up into levels the strategic planning is much more accurate as it actually addresses the needs for those year levels quite specifically.

I will definitely suggest implementing a document like this into a school library when I get back into the workforce if there is not one that already exists. A document like this enables everyone working there to have a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities and from here they would hopefully be on the ‘same page’ and work together collaboratively.

06
Sep
2020

21st Century Learning

categories: ETL504

This subject has definitely been one of the most interesting that I have completed throughout this course so far. The clear focus on what teacher librarians should be doing within schools and what they should be aware of as being instrumental to their role has provided me with such great insight. Some of these aspects I was already aware of, some of these were new to me and some were a strong reminder of what I need to be focused on.

The need for different areas within the library for students to work at without feeling they have to be quiet is very important. The need for teacher librarians to be skilled in technology and also seek further professional development if they feel this is required is important. It is vital that teacher librarians add value to the entire school particularly throughout inquiry and can show the staff how beneficial their role is to the development of the students. Teacher librarians show students how to collaborate, communicate and find meaningful resources. Teacher librarians are preparing students for their own future.

30
Aug
2020

Case Study Three Reflections

categories: ETL504, Reflections

I found this such an interesting and insightful task for many reasons.

Firstly, I was quite nervous about the workload and being involved in this task and I was wondering how it was all going to work. However, it has been such a great task to be involved in as it really helped me with my learnings and to actually be ‘in a group’ and thinking about the dynamics and leadership styles particularly as I am currently on maternity leave was extremely worthwhile.

From the beginning, I was very conscious about trying to be collaborative as this is important to me and I think it is a great way of involving everyone and ensuring everyone is on the same page. I started the group off in this way and posed a few questions about how everyone would like to go about roles and the actual organisation of the discussion group. Two group members replied to this, one with a similar idea to myself and the other who wanted to launch straight into it and set everything up before hearing back from the other members.

I found this really interesting. In some ways it was absolutely fantastic as I found it great that there was someone in the group who was very assertive and confident in her own thoughts and felt her way was the best way to go about it and literally just set it up. This approach made it very easy for the entire group as we just followed along and added our thoughts where appropriate. However, on the other hand, this approach doesn’t allow for members to get to know each other through a friendly and cooperative way. It could also be sending a message that others’ ideas aren’t important and we just need to get this done.

It was such an insightful activity as I hadn’t thought about it like this before. So many positives and negatives for both approaches. If the collaboration could have happened and then a quick decision/vote on the approach decided to take, this may have been a positive way to do this. Time was definitely an issue though and there was the concern that not all group members would reply so I can also see why one group member made a quick decision for everyone that would enable the task to begin. It also highlights the importance of everyone being involved ‘quickly’ from the beginning otherwise it makes it very difficult to finish the task in plenty of time.

03
Aug
2020

Draw.io

categories: ETL504

Draw.io has been a fantastic program to use in order to produce a concept map. I have really enjoyed finding about draw.io as it is very easy to use and the end result is clear and easy to read. I found the usability of this program to be very straightforward with a range of options to use in order to present my work which then provides more scope to present more complex ideas. This would be a great resource to share with other staff members and I also believe it would be fantastic for students to use. I will definitely be using this program in my future and work and sharing it with others so they can benefit from it also.

03
Aug
2020

Leadership Theories

categories: ETL504

It was really interesting reading about the different styles of leadership throughout this module. I found myself reflecting on different school environments and thinking about what worked, what didn’t work and why or why not. I hope I can take this knowledge, observations and reflections with me when I go back into schools.

Behavioural theories of effective leaders was an interesting place to begin my reading. The core leadership theories article outlined leaders’ behaviours and three ways they tended to make decisions. These included autocratic (making decisions independent of a team), democratic (involving the team for their opinions and input before decision making) and laissez-faire (allows a highly motivated team to make their decisions without input from the leader) (MindTools, 2016). I found myself reflecting on the type of leadership style I have enjoyed working under and that is definitely democratic.  However, the time I was working for a leader who had this style, I wasn’t working in a huge school but it definitely was not small and the problem with this style was that meetings would go round and round in circles at times. I believe that if this approach is to be used, needs to ensure they don’t let discussions lose track of where they should be going and ensure that there is a time frame as some people could discuss certain issues for a very long time.

There are many titles for the different styles of leadership being: Situational, transactional, transformational, servant, distributed and instructional. These can work effectively in different environments and for different people depending on their personalities and behaviours as mentioned above. I personally love the idea of working for a transformational leader as I like the idea of collaboration, ‘looking forward’ and inspiring employees.

MindTools. (2016). Core leadership theories. https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/leadership-theories.htm

26
Jul
2020

Teacher Librarians as leaders

categories: ETL504

Reading module two (2020) has been interesting for me. As a teacher who is wanting to enter the school library and become a Teacher Librarian this module has spoken very clearly to me as it has outlined the importance of ensuring small details do not get in the way of the bigger picture which is providing services to its users (organisation theory, 2020). This is something that I will ensure I take with me and remember as it can be so easy at times to become overwhelmed and deal with the smaller issues first, it is so important to remember what a Teacher Librarian’s goal and focus should be.  Obviously different schools have different objectives for their Teacher Librarians so it would be important to initially find out what these are, I am sure that in most circumstances the number one objective school libraries would be to provide a service to its users.

Sir Ken Robinson’s talk, ‘changing education paradigms’ (RSA Animate, 2010) is a great example outlining education systems and how they function, their faults and their impact upon student learning and creativity. This brought me to thinking about the different schools I have worked in and schools that colleagues have worked in and how the leadership models can be quite different. Some schools enable Teacher Librarians to engage with their students in a more creative way to meet learning outcomes in the Australian Curriculum and some simply want to reach outcomes disregarding children’s different learning needs or different styles of learning.

Teacher Librarians as leaders therefore have this opportunity in many ways to ‘help’ students, staff and school communities to create an environment to collaboratively work together to inspire their students to not only learn but also work and engage in a variety of ways. Jane Viner the recipient of the 2017 Australian Teacher Librarian of the Year stated “’C’ is key: create, connect, collaborate, communicate, care and change with your community’ (Hill, 2017, p. 29). I just love this quote, as a Teacher Librarian as leader can take these words and these steps to create an energetic, exciting and informative environment to engage students, teachers and leaders of the school to improve learning outcomes whilst providing an outstanding service at the same time.

(2020). Organisation Theory [Study notes]. ETL504 Teacher Librarian as Leader. Interact 2.

https://interact2.csu.edu.au

Hill, A. (2017). Australian teacher librarian of the year 2017: Reaffirming and celebrating the pivotal role of teacher librarians in our schools. Access, 31(3), 198-214.

http://web.a.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.csu.edu.au/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=7dd9ba89-1858-48ef-91e7-e43ec4c09d92%40sdc-v-sessmgr03

Robinson, K. [RSA Animate]. (2010, October 14). Changing education paradigms [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U

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